Author Archives: txherper@gmail.com

Moving On

September 23, 2013 – 12:07 am
Yesterday I took the skiff to town and then headed a short distance to the Pickled Parrot on Carenero for the monthly third Saturday of the month pig roast.

After a few hours I headed back to town.  I had to make an emergency turn to avoid a lunatic water taxi driver.  I pushed hard to the left to turn right and was left holding air, by the time I turned around there were nothing but expanding rings were my new outboard had sunk to the depths.  I was but a few hundred yards from my destination.

After travelling nearly a thousand miles in day trips of over 100 miles the shortest ride I ever took was shorter than anticipated.  I took note of my position and called a friend who quickly arrived with his boat equipped with side facing sonar.   We were pretty sure we saw the motor and a small plume of gas.  As the 15 HP has an external tank there is not much gas in the engine.  The coordinates were recorded and I was pulled to town.

“How’s it going Jim?”  “See my boat? Notice anything different?”  Few people noticed that it no longer had an outboard.   Ahh, well, what can you do?  I chatted with people a bunch of girls who had gone on boat rides with me, some locals.   The usual bullshit from uninformed residents born here, saying the water was only 20 feet deep.  It was 52 to 60 according to the depth finder.  Not bad, but I was in a muddy section.

After a while I just took a hotel room and went to bed early.  I managed to convince the hotel to let me stay without ID or payment, “I’ll pay you later.”  Don’t forget my wallet was given to the sea a couple of days prior.

In the morning I contacted Tony Sanders, owner and operator of Starfleet Scuba.  He agreed to help me and asked if I would help him with some plumbing problems in exchange.  Nobody can plumb worth a damn in Bocas.  It’s going to be an easy job for me. The dive was delayed on account of rain.  I wish we had had a lot more, remember my tanks were empty.

A boat was dispatched with four divers and a search was conducted but the motor was not found it is probably under a few feet of mud.    He traded me the services for some plumbing work, calling it a more civil arrangement.  I have about four hours of plumbing work to do, he offered me four hours of divers, with equipment and a boat.

Hopefully I can get some divers in the water at the same time as some guy with a side facing sonar and

I went to a chili cookoff, got too hot in the sun, and left shortly after the band started as it was too loud to talk so I walked down the street, hung out with some friends at a quiet spot where we could just hear the music.  They were kind enough to give me a ride and drop me off on the way home.

What’s next?  I need a change.  A big change.

First I will get the lower unit that I bought put back on my panga then I will probably only go to town to get groceries while I plan my next adventure.  I really need to put that kayak to some use and I could use the exercise.

So, I have to prevail on some friends to give me some cash and I will pay them via paypal.  Then I will cancel my debit card and order a new one.  It will have to be mailed to Texas, then to Florida, then forwarded to Panama City and then to Bocas.  It’s a pain in the ass.  I really don’t want to book a flight until I have it in hand but that would put my flight out at least a month.  I won’t replace the outboard on the skiff as I might not be coming back.  In any event it would just sit here, depreciate, probably get used without authority and possibly get stolen.  I couldn’t possibly burn up enough gas in a month to justify it.

But my days of hundred mile boating excursions for fun have come to an end.  My panga has about two weeks  worth of work to be done on it that I should have had done long ago, but it’s Bocas, not entirely my fault, but mostly, I was just not up to it or having too much fun to deal with it.

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Exhausted, Sore and Without Water

September 21, 2013 – 2:56 pm
Exhausted, dark, peeling, healing, waterless.

Where the hell have I been?  For a couple of months I was bed bound, anemic, weak, pale and fighting an auto immune disorder that I have had for thirty years.  It’s not life threatening, but it wears me down from time to time.

During that time I had few adventures, but one notable one to Rio Cana and the Island of Escudo.

Allow me to break for a coffee, using the last of the bottled water I have with me.

I won’t go into the details of my health, suffice to say that covered with bleeding, supporative wounds, hair matted with pus and blood, sticking to the sheets.  Every time I rolled something peeled off and exuded more vile bodily fluids.

An Ngobe I knew had a brother that needed some work.  Between clearing land and planting pineapples, palm trees, banana trees and various fruit trees I dispatched him to town to buy food.  The doctors in Bocas were not much help.  Eventually I went to David for medical treatment.  That was a medical disaster and I ended up leaving my wallet in a cab, getting it returned shortly thereafter sans money, getting a night club jammed in my sternum for entering a grocery store without shoes and losing my new tablet computer.

One night I went out for dinner and on the return trip asked the driver for his name and number in case I wasn’t up to taking the four hour bus ride from the Pacific to the Caribbean. The cab fare was $2.  He didn’t have change for a twenty so I popped into my hotel to get change and he took off.  I tried to flag him down but he ignored me.  He didn’t respond to my phone calls. The next night I saw him on the street in front of a bar with my tablet.  He had already paid somebody to do a factory reset.  How do I know it was mine?  It was in a very distinctive case.  As he was surrounded by a group of locals I couldn’t exactly grab it from his hands.

I went to the police station to report, they sent me to the office of judicial investigations, who sent me to the corregidor (a type of sheriff).  That office was closed and was closed the next day.  Ahh, to hell with it.  I wasn’t going to stick around for a couple of days to prosecute on the off chance that I would get it returned at an expense greater than the value of the lost equipment.

After a frustrating week and feeling significantly better I returned home but convalescence wasn’t in the cards. At one point I diagnosed with cutaneous leishmanias but a blood test proved that to be incorrect, thank the stars.

A woman was visiting from Brooklyn, another from Germany.  So, I did the usual and showed them around, boating to exotic and wonderous places. A long couple of days with Julia and sunshine and I started to feel human.

Tamika came down from Brooklyn with a camera I had bought online at Amazon.  Turned out  that all of the menus were in Japanese.   She also brought me a hammock I had ordered, complete with mosquito netting and a rainfly to be used on my overnight forays in remote jungle locations.

A neighbor had a kayak for sale, I bought it.

The Ngobe gardener who was going to watch my house while I was gone, with his family extended his stay for another three weeks.  They left a couple of days ago after consuming all of my water.  Without my knowledge he switched to my secondary tank, drained it and then decided it was time to move on.  No good deed goes unpunished.

Then, boating.  Girls, girls, girls. I don’t know, Olivia from Australia, Amy from New Zealand, a couple of German girls, a couple more German girls, more girls, girls from Panama City, Santiago, I lose track. Where do they all come from? They run into other girls in other countries, Peru, Colombia, Bolivia, Costa Rica, Nicaragua.  You’re going to Bocas?  See if you can spend some time with Jim.
Locals give them my number.

Expats cruising the hangouts looking for pretty young things.  A guy named Bill approached a beautiful tall exotic looking Australian woman. I overheard Bill say, “Jim Schmidt? Good luck with that!” as he stormed away.  I walked over to her.  “Hi, I’m Jim.   I heard Bill say my name are you looking for me?”  “You’re Jim Schmidt?”  “Yup.”  We chatted, bill glowered.  “hat guy is scary.  He got very angry when I mentioned your name.” “Bill is always chasing girls and is always alone, he is one frustrated guy.” We chatted some more and headed out to snorkel. An afternoon of snorkeling turned into four days of adventure, smiles and fun.

Seven hundred miles of boating in ten days.  This place is fairly small but full of new things to see if one explores.

Snorkeling, dolphins,  fish, Indian Villages, pizza, beaches, a bat cave, dropping in on friends, stopping off to check out random rivers.

An afternoon lazing on a hut built over the water miles from nowhere.

Then there was yesterday, day two with two German cuties.

We headed to explore the river to Changuinola, off to Bird Island where we watched frigate birds and boobies in great abundance and actually drove the boat through the opening in the island.  A giant crab fell down on one of the girls.  The most exciting day they had experienced in five days of travel had yet begun to unravel.

We were hot and decided to take a dip on an isolated beach on the windward side of Isla Colon.  Bad call.  The sand fell away precipitously, the waves picked up and started throwing the boat around.  Waves washed up over the stern and splashed the cowling.  We tried to drag the boat up on the shore but it was several tons heavier on account of the water in the boat.  Sand was thrown into the mix.  The contents of the boat floated around and with the withdrawing seas, out to sea.  

My water resistant backpack, with a camera and smart phone in it floated around in the sea water.  Water is bad for electronics.  Sea water is death.  Everything was double bagged, but these bags have seen a lot of use.  Good for unexpected rain, not good for immersion.

I tried to get the boat turned around, bow away from shore.  The girls were trying to drag the boat up onto the beach.  I was yelling at them to get away. The boat was lifted and thrown on me repeatedly.  One of the girls was going to get help.   I had to yell at her as loud as I could.  “Come back here.”  Don’t need a girl wandering barefoot through miles of jungle as the sun is setting.  Give it a couple of hours the sea will calm down at sunset.  With each big wave the boat was dragged up a little farther.  The seas were calming.

I  pulled the plug and a thousand gallons of water drained out of the little boat.   One of the girls insisted I consume some homeopathic remedy.  Homeopathy, what a crock of shit.  I pretended to consume her curative and drank two liters of water.

Finally I decided it was time to go.  We needed the aid of the seas to get the boat off the beach.  Wait too long and no waves would reach the boat.  We pulled the bow around and rapidly threw our belongings back on the boat.  Fortunately the upper unit on the outboard had received nothing more than splashes on the cowling as I had tilted it up full.  Now was there salt water in the tank?  That would be death.  I tilted the tank so that the pickup was at the upper point as gas floats on water.  It fired up right away and we took off.

Soon I was checking through my possessions.   The phone worked, the camera worked.  Where is my USB cable?  While checking for a three dollar cable I flipped my walled overboard in fifty feet of water.  Fortunately, I was just about out of money and there was little to replace.  I dove in anyway and upon pulling myself over the boat lost my pants.  The pockets were filled with sand.  I was naked on the bottom of the boat for but a short time as I had a spare pair of shorts in my backpack.

Back to town, the girls took me to a lovely seafood dinner.  On the way Bill glowered at us as he sat alone at the balcony at the wine bar.  Someone had picked up the octopus, crabs, fish and lobster I had bought at sea from a fishman in a dugout canoe.   Home to a deep sleep.

There you go, kind of caught up.  Working on putting together a real adventure, but the vagaries of my life warrant that I should actually begin the adventure before posting a plan.

Pictures

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Julia

August 12, 2013 – 3:24 am
Julia was planning on heading out to see Boquette.  The sand was running out of her trip clock. I managed to convince her to let me take her boating for a day.I picked her up at Casa Verde.  She brought her backpack.  Sure, you can spend the night.  First stop was a friend’s boat to drop off the backpack.  As the panga was there, the captain was in residence. I entered the salon and was astonished.  The boat was immaculately clean.  Usually there are a dozen ashtrays overflowing with cigarette butts, things scattered over all the counters, clothes strewn about, a sink full of dirty dishes, an aft deck that requires high stepping to get around.  But now, he is conducting tours on the boat.  I had no idea he had it in him.As I was taking off he appeared at a window and called out to me.  We motored back and he told me he was going on a cruise and would be back at six.   No problem, I’ll be gone past then.

As we made our way to Bahia Honda, the bay that separates my island, Solarte from Isla Bastimentos I functioned as a tour guide.  “There on the left is Old Bank.  It is a small community of primarily Afro-Caribbean people.  There is no road.  One central sidewalk…” “On the right is Hospital Point, where the hospital was located in the turn of the twentieth century.  It is now notorious as the domicile of a 72 year old pedophile.

Ian’s Place

Down the bay we went.  She spotted a large house up on a hill.  “Is that a house or a hotel?” “It’s a house, do you want to see it?”  I’d never seen it and he is my next door neighbor. My worker lives there with his brother who is keeping the place while the owner spends the summer in Montreal.

Clyde’s

Everybody loves Clyde’s place.  It is packed with ornamentals, exotic fruits and a very special character, Clyde.  The thunder started rocking, Julia was wet and cold, so she borrowed one of Clyde’s sweatshirts and a rain jacket, sampled various fruits and tasted his homemade white pineapple ice cream.

When Clyde found out that Julia was from Austria, he told about some guy he knew from Austria who was a pool hustler.  Julia knew the guy.

When we left, Julia just said, “wow” which is the same thing Clyde said when she went down to pick some pineapples. Yeah, she’s a cutie, alright.

Kirk’s

“Damn, I’m cold. Want to go to a coffee shop?”  We dropped by a toolshed that serves as Kirk’s house.  I had coffee, Julia had tea. We checked out the big boat that Kirk built by himself over the course of nine years.  Julia thought Kirk was awesome, as he indeed is.

Rana Azul

By now it was past noon. I hadn’t eaten yet.  “Want to get some pizza?”  Across some open water, through Dolphin Bay to Tierra Oscura, “The Darklands”.   Out in the middle of nowhere we rounded a point of trees to find a slew of boats. “I might know some people here.”
I knew them all. Julia was quite amused that 12 miles from nowhere there was a pizza joint, packed. When Josef came over with the menu, I mentioned to him that Julia was from Austria. They started talking in animated German.  Turns out that Josef grew up 10 kilometers from where Julia grew up.  She continued to be amused.  The pizza arrived and she declared it the best pizza she had ever had as she cut off tiny pieces and at them with a fork.  I, on the other hand, picked up slices and devoured them with gusto.She had a glass of wine.  A German friend of mine, who was infatuated sat in my chair and chatted her up incessantly.  She had a mojito.  Finally, I paid the bill and got her a to go glass.  We have places to see.

Crawl Cay

“Want to see a whole bunch of fish?”  Ok, Crawl Cay is right on the way.  We docked.  Not a fish to be seen.  I bought a dollars worth of crackers for a buck and a quarter.  I started throwing them in the water and fish started appearing.   I advised her to get in and threw in a bunch more.  The water started to boil with fish.  A few minutes later it was time to head on.

Salt Creek

Off to Punta Vieja, on the Southeast corner of IslaBastimentos.  We docked the boat. Our destination?  Salt Creek, a community of Ngöbe that is relatively affluent as it is a tour destination.  They charge to enter ($2) and for guided walks to many destinations.
A baseball game was in progress with a large audience.  We then walked the length of the densely populated section, stopping when we got to a barbed wire fence with a mud trail.  Not really something to be negotiated in flip flops.  A elderly man came out and started talking with Julia in Spanish.  Now, her Spanish is pretty damn good.  She holds a bachelor’s degree in Spanish and teaches it.  Strangely enough most of the conversation was him asking her how to say various things in English.

I was thirsty and asked where I could get some coconut water.   The man pointed and described the place then decided to lead us there.  Upon arriving there was a tree with coconuts.  Younger coconut palms sprout coconuts within ready reach.  Unless you are under five feet tall as was the Indian and as is Julia.  I grabbed one and twisted it off.  She had never seen this done.  Smiling, smiling, always smiling the whole day long.  I paid one dollar per coconut and our guide produced a very long machete, over a meter and proceeded to hack away at the coconut, removing mass quantities of husk and finally exposing the core.  I took a swig.  I don’t know why coconut water seems always cooler than the ambient temperature, but it was pretty refreshing.

We said our goodbye’s but he insisted on walking with us on our way out.  Then he collected four dollars for the entrance fee.  The station had been unattended on our way in.  I know not how he knew we had not paid.  There were no tourists in evidence as we had arrived late in the day.
On our way out we ran across a fisherman who had scores of small red snapper and a good sized mackeral.  We bought the mackeral for three dollars.  Onward!

Cruising

On the way out, I tilted up the outboard and directed Julia to watch for coral heads.  This is an

excellent place to mess up an outboard.   Finally we got to deep water and Julia took the helm. The seas, the open Caribbean were amazingly calm, with ripples no more than a few inches.   I pointed to the southern end of Isla Popa.  We drove by a massive hotel and then found a few houses erected in the water hundreds of yards from shore.  Good views, good breezes, no insects, why not?

Then we came across multiple structures in a cluster, three falling down and one so covered with lush growth it was impossible to ascertain the condition of the building.  Tiny islands, no more than 10 meters across jutted up 5 to 15 meters. We finally rounded the point and headed west.  Holy shit the sun is low.  I can’t navigate these mangroves in the darkness.  The little skiff doesn’t even have a compass.  Ever smiling Julia took us home under my direction.

Dinner

I just wanted to go out and buy dinner.  Julia wanted to cook the mackeral.  Whatever pleases you girl.  I fileted the fish and threw the scraps off the dock where they were rapidly consumed by a couple of rays. She heated some oil in a pan added salt and pepper. To the oil?  Hmmm. I’ll shut up.  Then she happened across a bag of peanuts and raisins and when the fish were near done sprinkled them over the top.  A few minutes later dinner was served.  It was delicious, but not nearly enough for me.Julia had a couple of friends from Austria in town. We went to Careening Cay to look for them and slipped a note in their door.Off to a sushi bar to fill up, buy some groceries for breakfast and head home.  You want to call them? We can go down to La Buga and Skype them from my phone.  Her friends were there.   Huh.

C’mon girl, time to go home.

A bright green meteor arcing a quarter of the northern sky draws the closing curtain on an epic day with a wonderful person.

Clydes Kirk’s Rana Azul Around Popa Julia Salt Creek The Trip

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Groundskeeping

August 11, 2013 – 2:43 am
Ok, I am done with writing every detail everything I do everyday.  This used to function as my diary.  I use evernote for that now.

What am I up to?  Groundskeeping.

My nearest neighbor to the west is in the process of opening up a resort, Bocas Style.  He started, suspended operations and moved back to Canada.

A giant wooden vessel floats in the harbor of the place.  Indians sleep in it.  In the primary house Silvestre lives with his wife.  His brother, who shall go by the name of Phillipe, his assigned name, as his real name is completely beyond the reach of white people.

Phillipe wanted a few days work.  Sure, I’ll give you three.  Well, the guy worked his ass off.  He will clean the house or do any field work I ask.  He is unbelievable.  He never stops working.  He has a wife and two kids and no source of income.  All right, let’s keep you busy.  My two hectare were cleared of overgrown grass in a couple of days.  I had him cut down some bushes that obstructed views of palm trees that were rapidly growing, planted by my last gardener, who has secured a job as a caretaker at a lovely house across the bay. When he watched my house things didn’t go so well.

In any event, for the price of what I spend on cigarettes I can have this guy eagerly improve this place.  After all the usual grounds were cleared I directed him to just continue to the west a couple of hundred yards to the second palm.

I was going to take a girl boating, but I couldn’t get hold of her.  I didn’t feel like going to that nearly vacant town to find there was nobody to ask.  So, I grabbed a machete and decided to clear a trail along the shoreline.  I’ve given up on those fancy $200 hiking boots.  They just can’t compare to $9 rubber boots.

Fifty yards deep in what was previously a dense collection of vines, saplings and branches I had made a trail to the next hill.  My phone rang.  Down the trail, up a hill, down a hill, up a hundred stairs.
A friend of mine called, he had some items that he had picked up for me in David.  Well, fuck, I knew that, you told me two days ago that you had it and were heading home.  I guess Clyde wants a little company,

I summoned Philipe and we headed over.  Just a few minutes on calm water.  I circled twice in the bay so that he could see me and know who was coming.   With his very bad knees I didn’t want him to walk all the way over to investigate who was pulling up at his dock.  It’s usually me, with one or two sweet young things, but you never know.

We took a bag full of pineapple pups.  They are new plants that grow out of the roots of the parent plant.  Yes you can grow pineapples from the cutoff tops, but pups were intending to grow.  We took a couple of score, some seeds from breadfruit and some cuttings from flowers. I got my goods and we headed out.

I dropped off Phillipe with our new acquisitions and went off to buy a shovel. I never got my shovel back from the guy I lent it to.  Such is Bocas.  Returning by an alternate route I popped by to see my old friend Kirk.  Last time I saw him I brought over a hot Brazilian girl in hot pants and rubber boots.  This time I was alone.

Nothing, I having for you nor am I asking for anything, just thought I’d drop by.

Then we planted everything.  The End.

Except, the girl just called.  Boating tomorrow.

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Shit Needs to be Tended to

August 5, 2013 – 8:00 am
Well at least my computer has a charge.

I discovered there is a lot of good stuff on youtube today, it’s not all music.  I watched “Pablo Escobar, King of Coke.” Just as it ended, my batteries ran low and my electricity went out.  Not much sun lately I haven’t had a full charge in days.  My generator went out a few days ago.  I could probably fix it myself but its easier to take it town and let somebody else do it.  The number of trips I would have to make if I attempted myself looking for parts is more than I want to deal with.

I believe I got my new lower unit for my panga delivered, I have to put that on.  And I have to go to Dolphin and carry down a thousand pound generator a long way down a hill along with a shitload of wire and a refrigerator.  I give up on that place, I can’t find any reliable help and it needs too much work.

So what do I have here a weeks worth of work? Well, It’s Bocas, I am not booking another flight on the expectation that it will completed.  I have booked two that I missed.

A woman waiting impatiently for me in Key West, thinks she’s ready to sail.  Last I heard she didn’t have a battery in her EPIRB, which is a mandatory device that signals the Coast Guard and broadcast your location.  Boat’s sink.  Shit happens.  Any through hull fitting, drive shafts, exhaust, toilets is a potential problem.  Yeah and we need an SSB radio.  VHF is only good for 10 to 15 miles depending on your wattage and antenna. And an engine out?  What is  your rush for me to get there? We each have things to tend to.

Typing in the dark, no lights on, the computer draws a lot of insects. Now I have no watar, the pressure tank is out and the pump, of course, needs electricity.

A woman is coming over to clean my house tomorrow, I guess I will have to send her right back. Hard to do without water and I don’t expect the batteries will be charged until noon, that’s if it doesn’t rain. That would disappoint her, I can get five gallon buckets filled with gravity from my water tanks.

Got to run around town and try to collect some debts. One will be easy, as soon as I ask him to he will paypal the money.  The thieving Indian worker at the finca is a lost cause.  The detective I lent $2,000 to, I sent him an email and told him I have a copy of every email and phone message about the loan and I have the deposit slips for the money I deposited in his account.  The woman who built a resort in Loma Partida with a generator she was going to pay me for in February of last year?  That’s a writeoff. You’re welcome, glad be of service.  I even picked up and drove it to the most remote island here for you.  Well, I got some otoy soup for my contributions.

Why can’t I sleep? I didn’t sleep at all last night and now its three in the morning.  This lack of sleep is showing.

So tomorrow its off to town to buy three tanks of propane, 30 pounds of dog food, 30 pounds of groceries and haul them all up a hundred stairs.

After I bail my boat out probably.

Well, I’ve found a family of four ready to move into my house, try to keep things going, take care of the dogs.  They are Indians that live next door on a giant wooden boat a marine architectural nightmare.  The thing is enormous and really top heavy.  I have no idea how many other Indians are living boat and working at the resort but I suspect its a lot.  So if you want to take care of the grounds and the cleaning which always be done.  Dead bugs on window sills in rails.  The guys are from Kuzapin. I have a great feeling about this.

Its funny, in some areas, like Dolphin Bay they all seem to be lazy thieves. So boats, outboards, generators, house wiring, batteries, gas tanks, this stuff gets stolen all time.

In Solarte, not productive, but honest.My gardener, an awesome guy got a full time job. I asked if there were any other good workers there and he told me no.  A guy down the way was building a compound and my gardener was the only person he hired out of a community of hundreds.

In Bluefields, they are amazing.  I had a couple of those guys clean my house.  I had a coffee cup on the table with some change and a few dollars.  I left.  When I came back there was $25 in the cup.  I don’t why I leave money, just bills that fall out of my pockets. Bluefields is near Playa Verde where I left my wallet on my boat with $500 in it and went to bed.  The next morning I was patting pockets, what the hell.  An Indian on the shore so me and pointed at my boat.  Yup there it was, unmolested.

Well I am thirsty I guess I go drain water from a tank. Enough of this, It’s three let me go try to get some sleep.

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Brain Farts

August 1, 2013 – 1:36 am
I have been chastised by a few faithful readers that there has been paucity of postings lately.  This primarily attributable to the fact that I haven’t been doing shit.  The amount of rain we have received in the last few weeks is difficult to comprehend, daily reports of just sitting on my deck with my dogs seems a bit much.

I have a few things scattered about that warrant attention.  More than a few, but I am inclined to allow these to be tended to by others, or just abandon these possessions and move on.

Admittedly, I vacillate between states of impressive productivity, slothfulness, self indulgence, and debauchery that I wont report. If I didn’t personally know many of my readers I’d consider it, but those that don’t know me would find these events dubious, the product of an inventive mind.

Pretty young things that want a few days of adventure, fly in from remote places, spend a little time and then head on.  But then go for weeks with nobody, not a soul, turn off the phone and be comforted by not much more companionship than the dogs at my feet, the geckos and frogs who frequent this place and an enormous quantity of birds.

OK, I will admit to an obsessive attraction to young hotties. Sure, you want to fly in run around naked, clean my house, cook for me and then leave?  Time and time again.

Be different, don’t pierce your nose.

“Tourists are easier to pick up.  But my dad gets more ass from girls my age than I do.”

Spam is dog food and insipid at that when it’s 3 bucks for 340 grams and hamburger is but $1.25 a pound.

Down 186 ampere hours and no sunshine is forthcoming.  Well, the tanks are full.
 
Boat bailing.

Yeah, the dogs obey hand signals. You’ve never seen that?  Come, sit , stay, lie  down, heel, fetch and retrieve, dance together on your back legs, that’s not a lot. It can be taught in a week.

When faced with adversity perhaps other options should be considered.
Wednesday, 7/31

8:39 Enough sun to get power but now there is none in town, so I have no internet.I have to check on my stocks can we have some frigging internet?

Windows 8 sucks donkey ass.

How can a guy that has 20 pairs of $300 shoes sitting in somebody’s house in Texas not even possess a pair of sandals? Island life is different, but attempting to  board a plane in rubber boots might create some issues.

Continual disruptions of electrical  service in Bocas, uncollected garbage, streets with vultures feasting on waste of unknown origin.

Those guys, running through the jungle and shooting the hell  out of things?  They are with the CIA, worst kept secret in Bocas.

All right, I’ll admit, I’ve booked two flights and and missed them both. Somebody is getting more than a little antsy waiting for me.

Birds, ants, mantises, moth, geckos, frogs, spiders and that fucking scorpion. Lobsters, a ray and a few dolphins popped by today.   There is a mound of insects on the kitchen floor, I guess I should take care of that and keep the doors closed.

Just a cayuco with a lufting sail.  

Oh shit, out of dog food.  Off to town.  Then the motor died. Are you fucking kidding me?  This thing has fewer than a couple of hundred hours on it, it’s what a month old?  No tools, it’s my little skiff.  While bobbing in waves just a few feet high water continually washed over the stern.  I can’t bail, set anchor and repair this thing all at once.  Ahh, just a clogged vent on the gas tank, remove the top and off I go.

Off I go, to town, to be greeted by 8 heavily armed guys at the dock.  AK47s and  flak jackets. Well, greeted is not the right word as I knew not a one of them.  I know most of the cops in this little town, they will give me rides  when I can’t find a taxi. What the hell is going on here?  This place is getting strange. So, I walked barefoot across a large expanse of broken glass and procured a couple of pounds of hamburger for the pups.  Gotta do what you gotta do. Life goes on.
I suspect my life is a bit different than yours.

So at 6:05 I get a request to have a few people live here, Ians Worker, 66521978.  Just a note to myself.  This is particularly fortutious.

Charts of the waters of Cuba, yeah, I can do that tomorrow.

“I don’t mean to molest you, but…”  Ok, I got it, you mean bother. Your English is far better than my Spanish.

“Did you catch your flight?”  Oh man, the stories I could tell.

“Come see me in hell, I’d love your company.” Now that’s an invite.
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Sometimes I feel so uninspired

July 10, 2013 – 3:44 pm

Tuesday

Bored.  Nobody in town.  What to do?  Mel, my most reliable adventurer had taken off to Red Frog Beach.  Bored.

Half an hour later she sent me a text message asking if there was anything to do there other than swim and hang out.  Hmm, you were just there.  I offered to pick her up.  Off to Red Frog, back past town, we headed, seeking a canal that was dug at the turn of the last century for transporting bananas from Changuinola to the sea.

Sixteen miles in and the engine seized then popped. I took off the cowling.  The upper unit was a total loss, oil and pieces of metal were everywhere.  I made a phone call and a friend and… oh, I have already told you this.

Wednesday

I hailed a passing water taxi and caught a ride to town.  A buddy had a couple of used 15 HP for sale.

He towed me to his house and I selected one of the motors that looked less hard worn, but that is a kind statement as they obviously had a rough life.  A worker was dispatched to get some gas from a village.  I have no idea what he was up to.  Near two hours later he returned.  In the mean time there was a coup in Egypt.

When he finally returned he placed the motor on the boat.  The things are light and I would normally have been able to do it myself but with my bandaged hand I was more than ready to allow someone else to do it.

I entered the boat and tried to start it.  It wouldn’t pull.  I pulled the cowling.  A cog that engages the flywheel preventing it from being pulled except in neutral was blocking the flywheel.  A piece of mangrove was duct taped into place.  I looked at the mechanism.  The cable from the shifter had been bolted on at the wrong place.  The stop lever was on the wrong side of the stop.  Why am I even bothering?  This thing was worked on by a hack.

I started it and took off.  The motor almost fell off the boat.  The bolts which secure the motor to the hull were broken off, the base plate for the bolts was missing.   Nope, I need to get a motor that I can rely on.

My friend pulled me back to another friends boat where I tied the skiff off and then he dropped me off back in town.  I priced some new outboards and made a few calls.

One cannot walk more than half a block down main street before running into somebody one knows.

I dropped alongside Lorie, of the Floating Doctors and we made it just a few yards when we passed Tropix.  “Weren’t you looking for new sandals?”  Yeah, I was and of course she knew.   So I popped in for a few minutes.   Most of the models topped out at size 8.  One must have been size 16.  WTF?  I found one pair in size 12.  I am not much of a fan of flip flops.  I do a lot more than just walk down beaches.  I never know when I am going to encounter knee deep mud on land or in the mangroves or find myself ascending a steep hill.

 I could stay in town at a nice hotel for the price of a round trip water taxi to my house so I did.

Thursday

I bought a new outboard for my skiff.  

Friday 

Broke in the outboard, long ride, tried to find the river to Changuinola, failed miserably. 

Saturday

Dolphin Bay with Mel.  Didn’t see a single dolphin.
Picked up Kivia a Brazilian who had recently finished hitchhiking from Patagonia to Iquitos.  We visited the neighbors and went home.  This girl had never cooked.   I showed her how to sautee some mahi mahi I had in the fridge.

Sunday

It rained in the morning, then off to Dolphin Bay and Aguacate.

Monday

Town, Red Frog, home.

Tuesday

Dropped off Kivia.  To resort and Aguacate with Cuba.

Wednesday

I need a change. Just sitting on the deck with my dogs with song lyrics running through my head.
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Changing of the Guard

July 3, 2013 – 2:30 am
Five and half, six, seven, eight, nine, ten.  WTF?  How late can  you sleep?  Eleven, twelve.  Sajoua and Candice finally showed their faces in the early afternoon.  The sunlight was more than half gone.  I guess our trek was a bit much for them.

Not much time for much, I took them to the bat cave and waited for them.  My lacerated finger didn’t need to be soaked in water tainted with guano.  Off to town they bought four pounds of Mahi Mahi.  Back home they made a salsa, cheese bean dip that we enjoyed with chips while waiting for the ceviche to “cook”.

Early in the morning I dragged the reluctant from their slumber and we prepped with strong coffee mixed with cocoa powder straight from the farm and coconut milk.  It was sinfully good.  Shortly after six we headed out.  They then faced an eight hour bus ride to San Jose, Costa Rica.

Back to town.  My old standby, Melissa copped out on me and decided to go to Red Frog Beach.  Few tourists, it is the slow season.  An hour later she texted me.  “What is there to do here, but lie around and be lazy?”  Silly girl, you were just there a couple of days ago.  Not much, swim and hang out.  “Ready for another adventure?”  “Sure.”

So, I headed out and picked her up at the dock and we headed out back past town and toward the other end of Isla Colon heading to a canal to Changuinola when the engine exploded.  I made a phone call and a friend told me he would come to get me.  About an hour later he called.  He had no idea where we were. I could see him, but he couldn’t see me as he was looking directly into the eye of god.

Go west four hundred meters then due South for a mile.   Towed to town.  Guess I’ll have to buy a new motor tomorrow and I have guests coming.  Better make this quick.

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Hiking

July 1, 2013 – 4:30 am
Ok, let’s try it again.  After an aborted attempt to cross Bastimentos on Friday with Mel and Sina (a Schweizer), terminated by a trip to the hospital to get a bunch of stitches on a gashed finger we set out again.  Some woman was reclining in a hammock.  “Are you going to go with us or just lie in a hammock all day?”  “I’ve already booked a snorkeling trip.”  Mel looked at me and we just shared a silent laugh.  Ohh, the tourist route, hanging with the throngs.  “Where are you going?”  “First a jungle trek, then some swimming then who knows what.”

We got on the boat.  The phone rang.  “Hi, Ricky.”  “Dos chicas están buscando.”  “Oh, hi, Cuba.  Bonita?” “Mucho.” “Donde?”  “Mar y Iguana.”  Then the conversation went downhill, I talked with one girl, then the other but the connection was really bad.  I texted that I would meet them at Over the Water Rentals and we headed out.   Ten minutes later Mel finally noticed that we were going the wrong direction, but she is well accustomed to my impromptu changes.

I docked, Marlin came over, I threw him a line, and Mel tied off the bow.  “Hi Claudia!”  Marlin, did two girls come here looking for me?  French.”  “No.”  “Hmm.”  So we walked to Mar y Iguana.  They had left, looking for me.  We exited and turned the other way to loop back around the other path.

No girls.  Back to the boat.  They called and gave me the name of a restaurant they were standing in front of.  “Stay there.”  Off I went again.  A couple of hundred yards down the road I spotted them and gave a big two handed wave and they responded in kind.  A guy pulled up to me on a bike.  “Two girls are looking for you.”  “I see them thanks.”  Repeat after 30 yards.

These cuties were obviously going to be fun.  Hell, they were all smiles just to have found me.  Back to the boat.  Introductions.  Head ’em up, move ’em out.  “Hi, Mauricio.”  We walked up to talk with an elderly Argentinian who lives in a camper.  I couldn’t make introductions as I didn’t know the girl’s names.  “This is Mauricio, also know as Santa Claus.”

We amused the guys at the gas dock.  Well, the girls did anyway.

They introduced themselves, Candice and some Moroccan name. We stopped by a friends boat and I dropped off their backpacks and suggested that they put some swimsuits on.  Mel and I went to the upper deck while they changed.   How does it take twenty minutes to change?  Who knows?

“Where are we going?”  “Trekking in the jungle to a beach.”   A few minutes later we pulled up to a small dock, found an untended pair of rubber boots.  Three girls, three sets of boots. I went barefoot.  A trail had been cut through a large swath of land across the island, from Bahia Honda to Wizard Beach on the Caribbean.  Up and down.  Up and down.  “Somewhere around here is a chunk of Jim’s finger.”  Mel and I have had so many adventures that she is now the tour guide and boat crew.

The path narrowed.  We crossed many a recently built bridge over streams.  Over logs, under barbed wire.  Many red frogs, a yellow frog.  Down yet another slope.  “WHOA!”  Wow, one fat iguana laid there, basking in the sun.  Lucky girls, the usually frequent the treetops.  “Is it dead.”  “No.”  Mel, posed for a picture and I managed to get one.  Then the other two girls tried but the iguana shot off like it was fired from a gun.  I am more accustomed to them dropping out of the trees from branches overhanging the water and swimming away.
Up a hill. Down a hill. “Look, a snake!”  Moving more slowly as we were walking on rocks and I was barefoot, I yelled, “Stay back.”  I don’t know what it was.  A black and white thin, long snake.  Up the hill to a pasture.  Goats roaming around.  
Down a hill.  The caretaker’s house.  I called him over.  He did not look amused.  I handed him his machete.  He was still not amused. Get over it, this is going to become a resort soon.   Down to the base of the hill across a boardwalk through the mangroves.  I yelled out to some guy walking along the beach.  He approached. “Is this Red Frog Beach?”  “No, that’s about a kilometer that we.”  He quickly checked out each of my fellow adventurers and headed on his way.
Pictures, pictures, we want pictures.  I have given up taking pictures.  Same places, same activities.  Sailing, snorkeling, boating, trekking, fishing.  One day flows into the next.
Yoga poses. Three girls in nothing but shorts and rubber boots, holding machetes.  More yoga poses.   I was frigging hungry.   Off to Red Frog beach, the next one over.  Down the beach, over rocks, up deep muddy trails.  Knee deep in mud.  People with machetes on horseback.  More mud. More people with machetes on horseback.  
A split in the trail.  I decided to take the short cut down a very steep slippery slope.  I was filthy anyway and it was better than walking barefoot on sharp rocks and coral.   Into the water.  Shit, sea urchins everywhere, black balls of fragile sharp spines that break off in your foot.  The girls walked without concern in their bikinis and rubber boots.  Yup, I offer a different take on Bocas.
Presently we arrived at Palmar, a lovely resort on the beach owned by the same guy who owns the land we just crossed.   The girls put down their boots, we washed our feet and had lunch, and walked back to the entrance dock.  A water taxi was about to leave.  I offered him $8 to take us to my boat, describing its location.  He knew the spot exactly.   
Back at the boat.  Mel returned the borrowed boots, we snorkeled and we headed back to town grabbed some grub and I took the two girls home for dinner.

https://plus.google.com/photos/111275040267764796607/albums/5895635789172135857

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A trip around Solarte – Take 22

June 26, 2013 – 1:30 am
The morning was spent reviewing my stocks, ensuring trailing stop % limit sell orders were in place.  Thank god I have computer that works.  Then I started buying some of the stocks that had automatically triggered sales after having precipitously declined after the Fed announcement of the planned cessation of quantitative easing.

Issus sent me a message.  Sure, let’s do something.  So we toured around.

I picked her up in Bastimentos Town.  Having just made her way down a hill in the jungle, coming from the permaculture farm she is working at she was wearing a black miniskirt and rubber boots.  What a sight.

“Where are we going?”  I just laughed.  I didn’t even know.   I was killing a little time before I was to check out a boat I might buy.  Lunch at the Pickled Parrot on Carenero seems in order.  George is an experience every local needs to have.  Closed.  Next door to Bibi’s.  Closed.

 Over to the south anchorage.  Nobody home. Where to? I had a twelve pack of beer aboard.  I was to have traded it for a couple of dead computers.  My intent was to salvage the hard drives.   Eight bucks for two drives is a pretty good deal.  The guy never came for the swap.

The Rip Tide should be open.  Back around town, between the populated water front and a huge barely submerged sandbar that developed years ago during an earthquake.  I docked next to the Rip Tide an old Key West wooden shrimping boat that now serves as a restaurant and a drinking hole for the local drunks.  There are plenty of people who start drinking red beer at nine in the morning in Bocas.  I ran into a friend who immediately made his way over to chat with us.  Within two minutes he found that she was volunteering on a farm and offered to let her live on his boat for free if she would only provide her own food and clean it.  Nice try Joe.  She had offered to stay at my house, cook and start a garden.  Maybe.

We headed east and I worked my way through the mangroves.  We pulled up at a dock and made our way along a wooden walkway through a large expanse of mangroves.  “Este hermoso.” Or something to that effect.

Presently we arrived at a little shack, situated on a speck of clay.  Retaining walls, secured by PVC encapsulated concrete pilings held the soil from washing into the bay.  The windows were shuttered, the door was closed, but Kirk’s boat had been at the dock.  A tiny generator was charging a car battery.  Not much of a power system but there is not much to power.  A couple of lights and a small TV.  The shack is a tool shed with a bed.  A padlock hung on an unsecured hasp.  I handed the six pack to Issis, asked her to inquire, “You asked for beer delivery?”  and stepped around the corner.

The door opened and a grizzled seventy seven year old man appeared.  The man is a legend and is more fit than most twenty year olds.  I met his extended hand and placed mine in to the rough bear trap.   He offered us some cold beers.  After a brief visit we headed out. I meandered through the many mangrove islands easily spotting my next stop by observing the types of trees and the contours of the tree tops.

Next stop, Clyde’s.  We pulled up to the dock and were greeted by Ohos, the dog.  Up the ramp we came to a two room house. The front half of the house had no walls, just gnarly thin trunks that served as posts and rails.  Tarps served to close the place off from the elements on particularly windy, rainy days.

Love the view?  Let’s go see the host.  We descended the steps to be greeted by Clyde.  From his belt hung a jungle knife he always wears, a leatherman and this time, a 10 mm semiautomatic pistol with a spare clip.  Issis asked about the gun.  “I didn’t recognize the outboard sound.  But I knew everything was OK when Ohos stopped barking.”  I am a frequent visitor, coming by two or three times a week with whatever companion I managed to secure on any given day.  Tourists stream through town.  Some stay for just a few days, others are “leaving tomorrow” for months on end.   Clyde extended the offer to slather Issis in coconut oil to protect her from the chitras that had not yet begun their daily visit.   I told Clyde I would return with her someday and we could cook up a dinner.  This suggestion was well received by both of them.

Just one more island and I had to take this Cinderella home before she had to try to navigate her way through the jungle in the darkness.  A crazy boat, a bizarre, whimsical structure adorned the bay.  I pulled around the point and a lanky blonde English guy waved at me from atop the hill.  “Hey, Jack!” We pulled up to the dock.  What’s this, my third visit this week?  Well, it’s part of one of my quick tours.  Our visit was brief, we shall return.  Ok, girl, let me take you back to your jungle lodgings.

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